(a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a modified thiolase protein with an improved activity, a polynucleotide encoding the modified protein, an expression vector and a transformant including the polynucleotide, a composition for producing biobutanol including the modified thiolase with an improved activity or a cell expressing the modified thiolase, and a method of producing biobutanol.
(b) Description of the Related Art
The increased dependence on the fossil fuel causes various problems such as global warming and high oil price. To resolve the problems, there are many researches to develop an alternative energy. The bioenergy has advantage of sufficient energy source and only an alternative energy source of fuel energy for vehicle, and has been researched widely. Until now, most researches on the bioenergy concentrates to production of bioethanol, but recently, research on more excellent biobutanol than bioethanol is performed actively. Biobutanol has high energy content, and can be easily transportation and storage, and directly used as a fuel energy for vehicle.
The biobutanol has been known to be produced by anaerobic bacteria, Clostridium acetobutylicum at most efficiently. Biobutanol is synthesized from acetyl-CoA through complicated six steps where each step is performed by each different protein. However, there is no research on the protein structure analysis of enzymes involved in the synthesis of biobutanol, thereby not identifying the synthesis of biobutanol at the molecular level.
Therefore, there is still need for identifying the mechanism of biotutanol synthesis at the molecular level by the structural analysis of relevant proteins, and for developing the modified protein due to information of protein structure.